Classic Raymond Chandler noir about a demobbed serviceman whose wife has loosened her morals during the war years. Johnny Morrison (Alan Ladd) comes home from the war and discovers his wife, Helen (Doris Dowling), has been doing her bit on the home front, sure enough. Eddie Harwood (Howard Da Silva), owner of the local nightclub, for one, seems to have had an easier war under her ministrations. He goes off like a cheap Chinese pistol on her one night and storms out of their house. Helen gets wacked the same night and Johnny's in the frame. His only chance of avoiding doing bird is to find the real killer himself. The amoral Eddie's wife Joyce (Veronica Lake) and two old army buddies volunteer to help him. The film suffers not a bit for the fact that Raymond Chandler apparently wrote the script (his first written exclusively for the screen) roaring drunk from start to finish!